Rags Bihag, Desh : Live, Pittsburgh 1989 (1991)

"Although guitar is a foreign instrument, he has a tremendous command over it. He has given a new dimension to it by merging the sound and style of guitar, sitar and sarod." Padmavibhushan Ravi Shankar Pandit Vishwa Mohan Bhatt was born in 1952, of a musician family of Jaipur in Rajasthan. He received his initial training from his older brother Shashi Mohan, and is now a disciple of Ravi Shankar. He has modified his guitar by adding several chikari (drone strings tuned to the tonic), and eight sympathetic strings tuned to the scale of the raga being played, which ring out in the background when their note is struck on the main strings. This hybrid instrument, which Vishwa calls the Mohan Veena, is played like a Hawaiian slide guitar, and is ideally suited for the sustained, sliding notes of vocal style Indian classical music. Sukhvindar Singh, from Ludhiana in the Punjab, is one of today's leading young tabla players. Learning first to play the pakhawaj under Nihal Singh."